


A Long Night

by enemyfrigate



Series: Day [1]
Category: Flashpoint
Genre: Developing Relationship, Divorce, M/M, Prequel, Workplace Relationship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-04-28
Updated: 2013-04-28
Packaged: 2017-12-09 19:04:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/776945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enemyfrigate/pseuds/enemyfrigate
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ed needs time. Sam is patient.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Long Night

**Author's Note:**

  * For [eviljy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/eviljy/gifts).



Ed wakes up all at once and blinks at the pre-morning darkness.The clock on the VCR, across the small living room, reads 4:14. Greg rasps out snores in his bedroom down the hall.

He lets his eyes adjust, knowing he will not get back to sleep now, and wills himself to wait for the alarm. If he can‘t get through the dark of one long night, how can he get through this divorce?

In the black of a winter’s dawn, Ed pushes away the need to reach out to find the other half of his life. All he’ll find here is the back of a couch or the coffee table still littered with yesterday’s newspaper. This is Ed’s world now: Greg’s couch, work, some clean socks in a duffel bag.

 

Ed is always on time, never slacks on his duties, especially the little ones never written in any field manual, all the interpersonal stuff that can’t be codified. He won’t let anyone see that he’s just slogging through.

Fuck, he wants to go home. Yet, he can’t let himself even himself think about it. That’s not an option. Sophie has made that very clear. Against all his instincts, all his desires, Ed has agreed to a clean break.

Ed always tries to do what’s best for the people he loves. So when Sophie told him their marriage was finished, he left, with as much calm as he could.

Greg asks no questions when Ed shows up his door and says, Sophie says we‘re done, just lets him in, brings him beer, makes him a sandwich, and puts him to bed on the couch.

A week becomes three months and Greg never even hints that Ed should move out. Ed talks, sometimes, and Greg is Greg. Greg is there.

The team is the team, which means they are there, too. Jules asks him for extra tactical tutoring, and drags him to her place to help replace the backyard fence. Wordy tries not to talk about his family, his girls, his home life, until Ed tells him to cut it out. Spike and even some of the guys on the other SRU teams offer him beer, softball, golf, camping trips.

He takes them up on the beer, sometimes, because they’re good guys and he wants to show them he appreciates the offers of distraction, but everything else, well, he just wants to work twelve, fifteen hours a day, eat something to keep himself alive, and pass out for six hours until dawn comes again and he can go back to work.

Sam surprises him. He’s not one for big gestures out in front of everybody, and he and Ed have never been close, but he’s always been there to take up the slack for his teammates, to give a ride or listen to bitching or find your goddamn keys which were in your locker five minutes ago, swear to god. He’s no saint, but Sam understands team in a way most people have to fake.

It’s Sam who suggests a concert Clark might like, and the pizza place to go after. Sam who challenges him to a shooting contest down on the range the day after the divorce papers arrive. It’s Sam who suggests Ed stand down when a woman is taken hostage by her ex-husband, and who nods, with perfect faith in him, when Ed says he’ll be fine.

And Sam comes with Greg when Ed goes to pack up his stuff from the old house, so he can move into the tiny apartment he found a few buildings down from Greg. He sticks around to carry boxes, heave the unwieldy futon mattress up the stairs, and eat Chinese.

Life goes on, and Ed even has a new friend.

 

That winter, another bomb drops, a smaller bomb, compared to the divorce, but a kick in the gut just the same.

The worst part, though, the worst part is that Ed isn’t happy, but Sophie isn’t happy either. Clark is okay, which Ed is damned proud of, but Ed knows Sophie, and even though the divorce had been her decision, she’s just about getting through. That’s why he agrees to meet her for lunch, at a busy diner he never goes to with the team. He loves her, though not in the same way as before, and he wants to help. He always will.

Halfway through her cheese steak sub, Sophie says, “Eddie, I think I might be ready to start dating,”

“Oh,” Ed says. He eats a French fry, at a loss.

“I don’t need your permission. I’m not asking for it. I just, I wanted you to know. I didn’t want it to be a surprise.”

Ed wants to be anywhere but here. He had expected that she would just start seeing someone, someone with a 9 to 5 job who would always be home for dinner. He had expected to find out from mutual friends, or maybe even Clark. This bald-faced declaration, though made out of concern, is a lot tougher to handle.

Ed makes sure his breathing is slow and even and then he speaks. “It’s okay, Sophie. If that’s what you want.”

“Maybe you should think about getting back out there,” Sophie says.

Ed shrugs. He hasn’t gotten his head around wanting anyone else. Not even Greg has suggested he get back on the horse.

He goes home to his tiny place, alone. He calls Clark, but he gets voicemail. He goes out for a run and comes back to the apartment drenched in sweat. He boots up the old laptop Jules had passed on to him and forces himself to look at dating sites, but closes it down five minutes later. That’s not his way. Ed needs to look at the person in front of him, not some ad, not like he’s ordering someone from a catalog.

 

Canada Day, false alarm at the big fireworks festival, but false alarm or not, that still means hours in the July heat in full gear, and the order to head back to the barn seems like a miracle when it finally comes. Any longer, Ed thinks, and they’d need a mop to clean the sweat out of the van.

Ed strips out of his gear and showers. He takes his time. He’s been invited to some barbecues, but he really just wants to be left to himself. He’s always loved fireworks. He’d wanted to take Clark this year, like always, but Clark had been asked to go camping at some lake, and Ed had said, sure, go have fun. That doesn’t mean he can’t go himself, though, and he likes the idea of being alone in a crowd.

This is the first good idea he’s had in months. Outside, Ed fills his lungs with heated, humid summer air.

“Ed, hey.”

Ed turns. It’s Sam, from the driver’s seat of his truck.

“You going down to the waterfront?” Sam asks.

“Yeah. What’re you up to?”

“Fireworks, man. Come on. I got a secret parking spot.”

Ed doesn’t hesitate. “Yeah, sure. Why not.”

They get hot dogs and iced tea on the street and wander the waterfront, meandering through the thickening crowds, heading nowhere in particular. Sam doesn’t say much, doesn’t talk about Jules at all, or work, just about music and idiot things he used to do as a teenager, that kind of thing. Guy talk.

“Hey, Ed? Eddie?”

Wow. That’s, that’s got to be -

“Andrew, man,” Ed says. Andrew still looks good, fit, has a little gray at the temples.

“I knew that was you. I’d know that face anywhere.” Andrew avoids Ed’s outstretched hand and pulls him into a hug, presses a kiss to his cheek. “You look great. How’re things going?”

“Uh, thanks,” Ed says, very aware that Sam is watching this unfold, this part of his life that he’d thought would never come up again, once Sophie had come into his life. “Going okay. Got divorced last year.”

“Fuck, sorry,” Andrew says. “That’s tough. How’re you holding up?”

Ed shrugs. “I got friends. Hey, this is Sam. We work together.”

“Nice to meet you, Sam,” Andrew says.

“You, too,” Sam says, sticks out his hand.

“So you a cop like Eddie?”

“Nobody’s a cop like Ed,” Sam says, and you could take it as a dig, but Ed fights not to look down and dig his toe into the ground.

Sam gets Andrew talking about himself, and Ed remembers why they broke up. Basically, Andrew is damn boring. Looks like all that SRU training has paid off, though, since Sam just led Andrew neatly through all the social niceties and eased them out of the conversation in about two minutes.

“Anyway, good to see you,” Andrew says. “Don’t be a stranger.”

“Yeah, sure,” Ed says.

“You used to date that guy?” Sam says, amused.

“A long time ago,” Ed says. “I was young and stupid, okay? He was hot.”

“So you’re older and wiser now?”

“Hell, no,” Ed says, and Sam laughs, bumps Ed‘s shoulder.

Later, as light explodes across the night sky, Ed glances over at Sam.

In the kaleidoscope of firework light, Sam is looking at Ed in a way that no one has since Sophie. Gold and blue fire shimmers and falls over his face. When the next light works go off, Sam is looking at the sky.

But Sam must have seen that Ed had looked back.

 

Ed wakes up the next day feeling good. To be wanted, that’s a nice kick. He gets up and goes out to do some errands. Food, light bulbs, one of those cheap DVD players and some Clint Eastwood westerns on sale. He wonders if Sam likes Eastwood, or westerns, or what Sam likes at all.

He thinks about asking Sam over to watch movies, sitting on his couch, beer and takeout, separated by just inches, and he can’t do it. Forget that he’s a team leader and he’s Sam’s superior. Hell, forget that Sam is young, and beautiful. Ed is still waiting for Sophie. His brain knows different, but his heart is stubborn.

 

Sam gives him two days before takes the next step.

“You want to get a beer?” Sam stands by his locker, shrugging on his jacket. He holds Ed’s gaze for about half a second longer than a buddy would, but then he looks back at his locker, reaching for his keys.

“Not tonight. Raincheck?” Ed’s mouth moves on autopilot. He’s not ready, he knows he’s not ready, even though there’s another voice in his mind saying, yes, please.

“Sure,” says Sam. He stops at Ed’s shoulder, adds, “but I’m going to keep asking. Okay?”

“Okay.” Damn it. Why can’t he just walk away? If he does this now, he’s going to fuck it up. Ed holds to that thought, listening to Sam’s footsteps in the hall, thinking about pressing Sam to the lockers and kissing him slow and deep.

 

A rough couple of shifts later, Ed takes Sam up on his suggestion. They go to a nice dark bar, a regular bar with regular people in it. They eat appetizers and drink beers and watch the hockey game.  
Sam makes no move to touch him, or treat the night like a date, but their shoulders brush pretty often, sitting there at the bar, and Ed lets Sam finish the last of his Guinness without smacking his hand away.

When the game is over, they head out the door. All Sam says is, “Night, Eddie. See you tomorrow,” before getting into his truck.

Ed gets into his car, watches Sam pull out of the lot - he lives in the opposite direction, so it was easy to suggest they take different cars - and thinks of dancing with Sophie on their first date. When he gets back to his apartment, Ed can’t sleep, thinking of Sophie, the feel of her sleeping against him, her thighs wrapped around his hips when they made love, her hair against his cheek when he held her from behind.

 

Two hot calls in one day. Fucking insane. Successful resolutions to both, though, so the end of the day feels like a job well done. Just in time for shift end, too.

“Hey, you guys want to go see a band?” Jules yells from the hall between the locker rooms.

“What kind of band?” Sam yells back.

“A basic rock and roll band. Ed, you’re going to love it.” Jules leans around the door.

“Oh, an old fogey band.” Wordy pulls a shirt over his head.

“Shut up,” Ed says. But when Sam says he’ll go, Ed says he will, too, and doesn’t even stop to wonder at himself.

It’s just the three of them in the end, and Ed drives, because they’re off duty the next day, and Jules says she’s going to get wasted. Ed is not, he tells himself, angling to drive Sam home second and have a proper goodnight.

Ed leans against the bar and watches Jules dance with Sam, comfortable with him, but like a friend just having a good time. The band is pretty good, and Ed is having a fine time just doing something fun, for once. He also can’t deny how much he’s enjoying the glances Sam keeps taking at him from the dance floor.

Sam and Ed pour Jules into bed at her house, lock up behind themselves, and Ed drives Sam home. More than once Ed keeps from dropping his hand on Sam’s knee as he drives. Sam keeps looking over at him, little glances. They can feel it. Something is going to happen.

Ed pulls up in front of Sam’s building. Sam turns toward him, but he doesn’t say goodnight, he doesn’t get out of the car. His lips part, to say something, Ed doesn’t know and doesn’t care. He takes a grip on Sam’s shirt and hauls him close.

Sam half falls over the console between the seats and their mouths meet. Sam improvises, on hand braced against the wheel and one arm around Ed’s shoulders, and Ed almost whimpers into Sam’s mouth, it feels so damn good just to touch someone again. He wraps an arm around Sam’s back. Sam settles against him and takes control of the kiss, slowing things down, asking him to open up.

Ed pushes his fingers in Sam’s messy hair, palming the side of his skull, lets Sam lead the way. Kissing Sam is amazing, and Ed can’t help but picture fireworks as Sam’s lips press to his and their tongues meet.

Then Ed thinks of dark hair against his cheek, and smooth skin under his hand, and he has to pull back. “Oh god, Sammy,” Ed says. “I think of you, then I think of Sophie. And I…I can’t do you justice, Sammy. I can’t give you the attention you deserve. Not yet. Not now.”

“That’s fair,” Sam says with a kiss-swollen mouth, not moving away. “I don’t want to mess you up.”

“I got to settle some stuff. In my own head.”

Sam gets an arm around his shoulders, holds him. “It’s okay. We’ll get there,” he says, and kisses Ed’s head.

They slide apart, and Ed knows he can walk away right now. This is the time to stop, if ever. Draw a clean line through it.

Ed reaches for Sam’s hand. They have the same callouses. “Wait for me,” he says.

“You know I will,” Sam says, serious. He squeezes Ed’s hand, and slides out of the car.

 

Bad days follow in a rush, five, six, seven days of hot calls, bad guys with shotguns, and grenades and shit. Wordy gets a concussion, Greg’s allergies have turned him into a wheezing monster, and even Spike goes around looking grim.

Ed’s beat, that seventh night, and he waves off Jules’ invite to get a burger, and takes himself home. Cooks a quick meal, a stir fry, nothing fancy, and sits down to eat at an actual table, with the ballgame on in the background.

Sophie calls, right after he’s put the last dish in the drainer, to ask Ed if Clark can stay with him while she goes to Mexico with her new boyfriend for a few days. Ed never took her to Mexico, but he feels only a little regret, not guilt, over this failure, and he gives props to the new guy for treating her right. More time with Clark is never a bad thing, either.

He goes out on the little balcony with a beer in hand, and settles in the wicker chair in the corner. The chill promise of a new season wends its way through the lingering warmth of a very late summer. The trees in the narrow courtyard have a few yellow leaves.

He wonders if he can get Bluejays tickets for Clark’s visit.

And Sophie, she’ll be in Mexico, and he’ll be here, and that’s okay.

Ed takes a pull off the beer bottle.

The invisible string holding him to Sophie is gone.

 

Ed goes in to work the next afternoon, even though the team has the day off after their long run, to clean his locker. He’ll never get to it on a regular work day, and it’s becoming a health hazard.

When he tosses the last stray sock in his duffle, he clangs the locker door shut and reaches for his cellphone.

“Please tell me we aren’t being called in.” Sam’s a little out of breath.

“I thought we could get a bite, maybe do something later,” Ed says. “If you want.”

Sam’s breathing evens out. He sounds like he’s smiling. “Oh, I want.”

“What sounds good? Mexican, Thai, steaks?”

“How about we try that rib place Spike was talking about?”

“Meet you there.”

“Give me two hours. I need to finish this run and get a shower,” Sam says.

“Okay,” Ed says, and wonders what to do with himself for the next 120 minutes.

He fills the time by heading home to do laundry. By the time he gets a load into the dryer, and changes his shirt, he’s actually five minutes late.

Sam is waiting for Ed by the front door, and Ed wants to grab him and kiss him right there. But he wants to take his time with Sam, and he settles for a smile that turns into a grin when Sam smiles back.

They eat, and go to an early movie. Ed doesn’t like cop movies, and Sam doesn’t like war movies, so they settle for a sci-fi blockbuster with giant aliens and a lot of explosions.

“Come home with me,” Ed says, in the parking lot of the movie theater.

“Thank god. If you’d made me go home with just a handshake my head was going to explode,” Sam says.

Ed laughs. “You think you can handle following me?”

“Yes, sir,” Sam says, and salutes him.

 

Ed opens the door to his apartment, a place he’s learning to call home, and ushers Sam in. He hasn’t been here since he helped Ed move in. The place looks a hell of a lot better now.

“So,” Ed says, and realizes he has no idea how to start.

“Eddie. C’mon,” Sam says.

Ed walks forward into Sam’s arms, feels Sam wrap tight around him, and lets his head drop to Sam’s shoulder.

“I got you,” Sam says. “Always going to.”

 

Ed wakes around dawn. Sam sleeps on his back next to him, the gold light of a new day gilding his face.

He slides over closer to Sam, drapes his arm over his bare chest, and relaxes into the mattress. The future, his future with Sam, looks good.

Finally.


End file.
